Minturn’s Lionshead rock may need a new name after a large chunk broke off and roared down the hill last Saturday.

As the chunk rolled down the rock cliff near Minturn, it broke into two massive boulders. The rocks took out phone lines and landed on an inactive railroad track below.

No one was hurt, and no homes were damaged.

“I saw this huge boulder that had cut the railroad track in half,” Minturn resident Tessa Manning said, describing how she discovered the scene while walking her dog on Tuesday.

Manning said the boulder she saw was bus-sized.

CenturyLink spokesperson Randy Krause confirmed that the rocks knocked out six of the company’s lines and cut phone service for residents in Red Cliff for more than 24 hours.

The break is thought to be a result of repeated freezing and thawing the rock has experienced. Chunks breaking off rock formations is not uncommon in Colorado and the Minturn area, according to Forest Service district ranger Dave Neely. He noted that the slope below Lionshead is covered with boulders most likely from similar breaks.

“It happens all the time. Like trees falling in the woods,” Neely said. “It’s a natural geological process that sometimes they shed their skin.”

According to Minturn town treasurer Jay Brunvand, smaller chunks have fallen off over time.

“It used to look greatly like a lion, but over the years it has really become flat,” Brunvand said.

The chunk fell from the south side of the face.

“Its a good thing they came down from that side because from the other they would have hit buildings,” Brunvand said.

“Old Man of the Mountain,” the famous stone face in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, which had appeared on a U.S. postage stamp and that state’s quarter, collapsed from similar causes in 2003.

The owners of Boulder’s Sterling University Peaks apartments, who this summer were cited for illegally subdividing 92 bedrooms in the complex, have reached an agreement to settle the case for $410,000, the city announced Thursday.